The rise in petrol price damages the National Front

The rise in petrol price damages the National Front



THE GOVERNMENT WILL SAVE RM1.4 billion by raising petrol prices but
it will cost Malaysians five times that. This saving will be spent on
public transport, says Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak. So we must be
happy the petrol prices are up! In 1990, it was 1.10 a litre, today
it is 1.92 a litre. This is said to be inevitable. But is it? Its
explanation why it is necessary comes after the public rebelled. Will
the Malaysian government tell us, as rumours put it, why we are
selling oil to Taiwan at about RM20 till 2010. Again as rumours,
which turn out to be true most of the time, tell it, Malaysia is
paying Taiwan US$40 a barrel for all the oil we do not sell or use.
Most of that oil is left in the ground, but we pay nevertheless. When
this was raised with senior people in government, I was told that
this was an invalid contract, and that it cannot be true: "If what
you say is true, this is an unequal contract, and will be set aside."
But some talked as if they knew about the deal. This rumour may be
false, but before it gets wider publicity, the government must come
clean about it. But can there be an unequal contract when the sale is
on a willing buyer-willing seller case.

If general election was coming in the next few months, the government
would not have raised the oil price; if it did, it would have
absorbed it. There is no general election in the air, and there is
enough time to fool the people and be swept in power. But the
National Front government has blinked. It announced public spending
in transport of the savings. What is means RM1.4 billion would be
available every year. This is nonsene. This claim on improving public
transport is to hoodwink the people into believing that the RM1.4
billion savings is to improve public transport. There is, as far as I
know, no attempt at improving public transport before the petrol
hike. It this had been announced before the petrol rise, the reaction
would not be as sharp. I suspect the government was taken aback by
the public response that Dato' Seri Najib annonced this saving would
be put in improving public transport.

But a rise in petrol price affects the living costs of the people.
The salaries would not go up even 18 per cent, the percentage of
petrol price rise. But cost of every day items would go up sharply.
The National Front knows this. This is why the official statements
are made now to soften the attacks on it, not so that public
transport can be proved. The National Front – UMNO, MCA, MIC,
Gerakan, IPF, the Sarawak and Sabah parties, and others – have
assumed they know what the people want, that having voted them into
office, all their actions in office are to help the people. But over
the years, they have done the opposite. The long suffering Malaysian
have been glutton for punishment. They will gladly vote the National
Front into office election after election. It had an irritant
opposition from PAS, the only other political party which has the
wherewithal to become the government of the day, but that day is far
off. The National Front known this psychology of the voter only too
well. Their aim is power forever, and they will tell any tall tales
to ensure that.

But there is a fly in the National Front ointment. The younger
voters, particularly the Malays, do not believe in this widely held
belief that UMNO, its lead party, is there to ensure that their
rights are looked after. It had turned UMNO into a religious party,
which the National Front has endorsed. It fights a political battle
to have its version of Islam – called Islam Hadhari under the Pak Lah
administration – against the PAS version, which is actually the Islam
ordained in the Quran. This is understood by the UMNO leadership, for
when UMNO meets PAS head on – in Kelantan, Trengganu, Kedah and
Perlis – there is no mention of Islam Hadharii and the talk is of PAS
misusing the Quiran. UMNO has become Islamic, and takes PAS to task
over 'misuing' it. Malaysias only hear of PAS members joining UMNO
but after it became Islamic, many UMNO members have joined PAS. That
is not reported, for that in National Front eyes, is not important,
and the newspapers, in truth its propaganda organs, do not report it.

UMNO leaders – the other leaders in the National Front will not open
their mouths except to echo UMNO words, whether its members and the
communities they represent believe it or not – make their statements
in support, virtually telling the people that they would do as they
like. But it has to be careful now. The ordinary Malaysian do not
believe that. In the past, they had no avenues. Now they write or say
their piece on the Internet, which is more believed than the public
relations rags of the National Front which make their appearance as
newspapers. The Government makes sure that all newspapers follow a
line. It replies to Internet queries in formal press conferences,
which is reported as a secretary would write her report. The
Malaysian media, orwned by the government or National Front members,
do not report the opposition to government policy. So the reaction to
the petrol rise on the Internet is believed more than the reporting
by the official media, which acts as always the megaphone to
authority. The reporters, knowing which side their bread is buttered,
go along. But it is these reporters who know what is going on. In
Myanmar, for instance, it is these reporters who articulate what is
wrong with what they are writing, and more accurate and believable
than the diplomatic briefings. It is beginning to be so in Malaysia.

The National Front hopes that the Malaysian public will forget the
furore over the petrol price rises. As it hopes that it wants to make
women, non-Malays, non-Muslims second class citizens. The opposition
to these moves have only now accepted that Malaysians must be
canvassed against these moves. This will give the National Front a
head start, but it would have to fight hard to get Malaysian support.
In the heady days of Independence and before, UMNO could do all this
because it was a nationalist movement which brought independence. No
political party would get much support if it challenged a nationalist
movement. But since 1987 UMNO is a political party, and therefore
defeatable. This happened in India in the 1970s, and the first
opposition was led by a former member of Congress, Mr Morarji Desai.

UMNO and the National Front is going that path. This is inevitable
now, although it might be 20 or more years afterward. The rise in
petrol price, which it might be inevitable, is yet another reason why
the National Front and UMNO is on the defensive. Add to this Pak
Lah's irrelevant homilities, the belief that his son-in-law leads Pak
Lah by his nose, infighting in UMNO and the National Front. It will
be a long time before the National Front joins the opposition in the
centre, but it will have to learn the art of explaining its policies
to the Malaysian people, an art it forgot as the art of government
became more important than succouring those who voted them in.

M.G.G. Pillai